Walking While Black in Madison, Wisconsin

So I finally made it back home after traveling through Atlanta, Spartanburg, Chicago, Madison, and Cleveland…and I couldn’t be happier.While I did have a great time in the cities I visited, I have to say that I have newfound respect for ANYONE who can live in cities like Madison, Wisconsin in 30 and 40-degree weather.I will never ever complain that it’s too hot in Los Angeles again!

I was in Madison on speaking engagement at the 16th Annual Building Unity Multicultural Conference at UW-Madison sponsored by the United Council of UW Students.I presented their keynote on diversity and defining who you are.The conference offered students from across the state the opportunity to explore new ideas and develop practical, productive organizing skills while addressing topics spanning the intersections of gender, race, sexual identity, class, ethnicity, nationality, ability, and religion.The end goal was to encourage UW Students to recognize and understand their differences while working together for a common cause.

Okay, so that was Sunday morning and the event was great.I really enjoyed speaking with the group of about one hundred or so students.Kudos to Sheltrese McCoy, Multicultural Issues Director for the United Council of UW Students and her staff for putting on such a great and well attended event.

Fast forward to Monday.On Monday morning, I decided that before I headed to the airport I wanted to check out A Room of One’s Own, Madison’s feminist bookstore.

Now before I go any further, let me just say that Madison isn’t known for having a significant number of Blacks living there.I can probably count on one hand the number of Blacks I happened to come across during my visit.

So anyway, I leave my hotel and head over to State Street where the bookstore is located.As I am waiting to cross the street, two police officers are walking towards me.They pass me.I then casually noticed out of the corner of my eye that they had stopped and were now standing behind me.

So I am still waiting for the signal to change when one of the officers approaches me and says that she’s going to have to see my I.D. because they are looking for a fraud suspect that matches my description.

I told her that I just left my hotel, that I am visiting from California, and it’s not me.

She said that my build and hair color, the red highlights in particular, were a match for a suspect that they were looking for.

I told her that there weren’t enough Black people in Madison for me if as soon as I come out of my hotel I am being accosted by the local police as a fraud suspect.

I eventually pulled out my I.D., while giving her a piece of my mind. While she’s copying my I.D., I call Sheltrese who was waiting for me in the bookstore and tell her what’s happening.In the offset chance that I am hauled off to police headquarters, I needed somebody to know where I was.

Sheltrese comes over there and starts asking questions too.According to Officer Sue Krause (Badge #2630) with the Madison Police Department, word had come down from her supervisor a couple of days ago to be on the look out for a Black woman with red highlights.

Did I mention that I only arrived in Madison on Saturday afternoon?I told Officer Krause that at least three times.

Sheltrese and I started going in on her about the red highlights, since that was really what she was using, besides my being a Black woman, to detain me.I told her that it would’ve been more helpful to know how the suspect’s hair has was styled.In other words, I have locs with red highlights.Did the suspect have locs or straight hair?She didn’t know.

Eventually she let me go, but not before she copied the info on my I.D. and I got her name and badge number.

It took a hot minute for me to cool down after that.

I am not used to being detained in the street by the police.I am not used to being pulled over by the police.

I realized afterwards, that had she been of the mind to take me down to police headquarters for further questioning, she could have.I would have missed my flight to Cleveland in the process.Thank God for small miracles.

This was the first time that I ever experienced something like this and it made me think about all of the brothas that go through this on a daily basis, oftentimes not being able to just walk away and go on about their business like I did.

I hope that what happened to me today is not reflective of the treatment that the few Blacks who call Madison home, have to go through whenever they are walking on the street while Black.

I didn’t appreciate being detained on the street like that in front of passerbyers, white pasderbyers, who without knowing the situation only saw a Black girl being detained by two police officers.

And while I won’t let what happened keep me from visiting Madison again, I have to say that it was definitely an experience that I could have done without.I guess if I wasn’t officially Black, I was baptized today with my first official police detainment.

I keep telling folks—male, female, gay, lesbian, or heterosexual, Black is Black.You don’t get pulled over for driving while gay, but you do for driving and walking while Black.

I never thought I’d be so happy to see the L.A.P.D.At least here, I know what I am dealing with and in a city with so many Blacks, I am less likely to be accused of being a suspect solely based on my skin color and red highlights.Black women and red highlights come a dime a dozen in L.A., you need a little bit more information to work of off before you make a move like that.

Photos From My Trip to Madison, Wisconsin

Jasmyne A. Cannick

Jasmyne Cannick is a nationally known writer and commentator on political, race and social issues. She was selected as one of ESSENCE Magazine’s 25 Women Shaping the World, one of the Most Influential African-Americans in Los Angeles Under 40, one of Los Angeles’ Most Fascinating Angelenos by the L.A. Weekly and one of 40 People Under 40 by the Advocate. She’s worked in the U.S. House of Representatives and at all levels of government helping to shape public opinion and encourage civic engagement while advocating for underrepresented and marginalized communities in the political arena. Learn more here.

What do you think?

A Boy Named Sue…

It was two police officers identifying a person who fit the description they had. They asked you for your ID and some questions that would either rule you in or rule you out as being the person that their description describes.

If they had a description of me, and they stopped me on the sidewalk, I don’t care what their skin color is, or what my skin color is, or who sees it happen on the street. It’s an identity matter. I would hope that they want to make sure I’m not the person they’re looking for, and I especially would want to make sure that they realize I’m not the person they’re looking for.

While telling them that you just left your hotel and are from California seems like enough, they don’t know if you are lying. And if they’re looking for a fraud suspect, they would probably not simply believe that without proof. Which is where the ID part would come in. Fraud suspects could be flying in and out of town, or live in California, and operate in Madison. They simply don’t know.

Telling them that it would help if they had a better description does not help them. If they could get a better description, they probably would.

I am sorry that you fit a description of someone who did something illegal. That would probably be less than pleasant for anyone who was in that situation. But as a community member of Madison, I don’t think you should criticize the MPD for stopping and asking you questions because you match a very simple description.

I hope the next time you come to Madison you have a more enjoyable time, and perhaps you will have better interactions with the police. The MPD is one of the most open-minded police departments I have ever seen or heard of. I know several current officers who trained in their academy and joined it because they agreed with MPD’s mission is to provide law enforcement to the community without any bias towards sexual orientation, skin color, or cultural heritage.

Sean

I’ll second the above posters words. First to apologize on behalf of the city for the way the encounter you described made you feel, but second to reiterate the open-mindedness of our police force. Our police chief, Noble Wray, is doing what he can to improve security and safety citywide. I would have a hard time believing that the Madison police would be profiling, especially considering that Wray himself is black (the MPD website has a photo).

First impressions are exceptionally hard to overcome, but please don’t let this incident dissuade you from visiting our city again.

Jason

Oh please. I’m a 30 year old white male with brown hair. Should I expect to be accosted by the cops walking down State Street? I can guarantee you they have a suspect description for a white male in his 30s with brown hair. They probably have dozens at any given time. Yet I walk down State with impunity every single day without so much as a sidelong glance from the police. So what’s the variable?

Chris

What can you say? The cops can’t identify a 30 year old white male with brown hair because there are so many. However there are relatively few black women in Madison and even fewer with red highlights. So they identified and stopped someone. It’s probabilities not racism.

In fact, it’s not just “relatively few”; according to the census, there are less than 2000 black women in the ENTIRE Madison metro area between 30 and 40, for example. How many are downtown? Say a high estimate of 20% so that’s 400. How many of those 400 have red highlights? Say 10%; that’s 40. So by stopping you there was a 1 in 40 chance that you were the suspect. That’s totally reasonable.

I’m sorry if they made you feel singled out but you were. If they were looking for a 30 yo WM with brown hair, a handlebar mustache and a butterfly tattoo on the neck and I had those things shouldn’t I be stopped?

qwerty

unfortunately, your experience is all too common in Madison. I don’t think it a mere coincidence that for every white person that gets charged with a drug crime in Dane County, 97 African Americans are charged with a drug crime.

but as to your specific situation, i’d strongly advise you to make an open records request on the officer who stopped you, as well as the case they were “investigating” and any other cases they were “investigating” that day. wisconsin has very liberal open records laws, and you can get very useful information, including the following:

-details on the fraud case. was there really a fraud case? were they investigating something from 5 years ago? was there more specific information that the officers ignored. how many people did these officers stop that day? were they just stopping random black women and getting their info? how many fraud cases with perp descriptions are open? how many are these two officers investigating?

-who else did they stop that day? how many white people were stopped by these officers that day that just happened to “fit the description”? how many blacks (or latinos) were stopped that day by these officers who just happened to “fit the description”?

-what are they now going to do with your information? police departments (madison included) are notorious for stopping people just to be nosy and get their information, which they then keep on file. this is really not good, because it’s how they build an internal case on people (by tracking police contacts). i would strongly advise you to send a sternly worded letter that 1) you are going to contact a lawyer to determine if the officers violated your civil rights and 2) demand that if you choose to not go forward with any legal proceedings that any and all information obtained during the stop, and as a result of that stop, be completely destroyed immediately.

you need to put the fear of god (or fear of a letter of reprimand or fear of a lost pension) into police officers before they will respect you. they may be able to push you around on the street when they stop you for no good reason. but you can push back even harder after the fact by letting them know you will use ever procedure, administrative rule and the law to exact a bitter and painful revenge.

i would strongly urge you to take my advice so they think twice about stopping the next African American ro Latino for no good reason.

peace (i hope your next trip back to madison is betetr)…

qwerty

to chris:

are you really saying that if the police have a detailed description (including facial characteristics and identifiable tattoos) that then they should be allowed to stop you, but all they need is a hair color and that is enough to stop a black person?

really? should all black women with red highlights be stopped for questioning? (fyi – black women with red highlights is more common than you think).

what if the perp washed out the highlights and returned to black hair (i would do something liek that if i committed a crime). should all black women be stopped and questioned just because they MIGHT have had red highlights in the past.

if you don’t get it, “red highlights is similar to “having a mustache” for white people. if the police are on the lookout for a guy with a mustache, should they stop everybody with a mustache? what if the guy might have shaved his mustache? should all whites, with or without, mustaches be stopped?

i’d really like to hear your thoughts on this?

A Madison Dave

That’s verrrry whiney. Want some cheese with that? Blame our chief of Police. He’s black. We have a very professional police force in Madison. Most officers have Master’s degrees. Once they took your ID, they let you go. That’s no fun, but that doesn’t constitute an abuse of power. Sorry, Princess, you’re barking up the wrong tree.

Jason

“if they were looking for a 30 yo WM with brown hair, a handlebar mustache and a butterfly tattoo on the neck and I had those things shouldn’t I be stopped?”

Absolutely. That’s what we call a reasonably specific description. Far different than skin color and highlights. I’m not saying the cops here are actively racist, I’m saying they, like a lot of this town, don’t know how to deal with people who aren’t midwestern, middle-class whites. That was the point of the post as well, if I’m not mistaken. In any event, locating a suspect by checking every black person’s ID is not police work and it’s not legal, I don’t care how few people you have to ID or how good the probabilities of success are.

Sheltreese

Well, I am very surprised to see so many MPD supporters on this website. But, as the second party to the incident I would like to say i am very upset that a national award winning journalist would come to visit our fair city, to impart knowledge to Wisconsin students and be abruptly stopped by the police while one block away from her hotel and eventual destination. I understand that intentions are hard to determine but I also understand sticking out like a sore thumb, and that being detected. Along with Jasmyne my blood ran hot for a while after the incident because I saw no just cause for questioning with such a vague description of the suspect. I love my job and It is very important that I bring national leaders to a number of cities around the state. I can only hope that this situation does not repeat itself with those guests. Also for the record, in 2005 Wisconsin was recorded as having the largest population of African Americans in prison compared to their population in the state.

Will

I think I may have missed something here…let’s see…historically, African-American males and females have been stopped and questioned by police officers for doing nothing but matching a description that typically does not remotely apply to them at all (except for the red hair in this case)…I think that is where the “rubber meets the road” so to speak—The problem is that this happens waaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyy too much…that is the point.

Once or twice to a few Black folk every now and then is one thing, but if it is 2008 and I (as a Black man) know that when I am pulled over by the Police for any reason, have to remind myself to put both of my hands on my steering wheel and wait for the police officer to come to my driver’s side window and ask me for my driver’s license…and then I have to inform the officer that I am going to reach into my back right pocket for my wallet and give it to him…get my point. The fact is that more Black men have been injured or killed by law enforcement for routine traffic stops that it is well known that you have to be very explicit (read: talk to them like they area 2 year old) about what you are doing with your hands so that you don’t become another statistic…it just becomes tiresome to have to do the thinking of 2 people (you and the law officer who may very well injure you for just being you…)…

The responses to this post are an excellent reminder that there really is two Americas, and that the interactions and expectations of Black and Brown people when dealing with law enforcement are very different from our fellow White citizens.

Most White people would look at this situation and conclude that since they had done nothing wrong, it was no big deal.

Most Black and Brown people know that being innocent in a situation like this would not keep them from getting arrested, depending on the mood of the officer they were dealing with.

Glad to read you were able to keep on moving Jasmyne…

sterling

I lived in Madison for over ten years. As an African American female, I can tell you that your experience is excepional but not that unusal. You just received the treatment that Blacks that live on the other side of Park street receive.

Now I worked with various organizations when I lived there so I was well know by the MPD, and yes, in a good way. But the area of town where most of Black Madisonians live the treatment is different.

They were looking for a black woman with red highlights in her hair. How tall was she, how was she built, what was her coloring? No, we don’t all look alike.

Madison prides itself on being a liberal city, strong on diversity, so strong on diversity that the university photoshopped a black male into a picture for one of their publications. (yes, they did).

I’m glad that you enjoyed A Room of One’s Own, it’s a great bookstore.

When I get time I’d like to tell you about the difference in racism in places like Madison as compared to other places in the US.